Digging the Hole
by Nature9000
Summary: A series of mistakes beginning once Freddie has left college, he finds himself at an all time low. Destined to pave a new path for himself, he gladly moves in with someone that he met online and formed a relationship with despite the pleas of friends. What he finds is a life that has him digging a grave he cannot climb from. Could he fix his mistakes and climb or is it too late?


Digging the Hole

Disclaimer: I don't own iCarly

A/N: This is kind of an AU since for this, Sam can never have met Freddie or Carly. This is a bit of a therapeutic thing, something to get off my chest I suppose.

ANYWAY, read with an open mind and so on. It's in Freddie's perspective, and I place him in a _similar situation_ to something that happened many years ago. _To my Readers_ I want to thank you for your continued support through this process. I post this now as a promise that I will push through and write this. But give me time to work on this. Serious.

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Chapter 1 (Trading One Hell)

May of 2009, nineteen year old Freddie Benson sat in his father's tiny apartment with his laptop positioned on the table. He was visiting his dad and stepmother after the virulent argument he had with his grandfather hours before. He was still shaken, and his stepmother wasn't making it any better.

"I don't know why you give your grandfather a hard time," Tricia moaned while flailing her hands in the air. "You're the one that dropped out of school, and are you even making an effort to find a damn job?" Freddie focused on his computer, letting her rant continue.

He hated that she was being such a hypocrite, it was her that told him it would be okay if he left Midwestern and that he wasn't ready. Now she and John both turned the tables on him and were calling him all sorts of names under the book.

Their most favorite seemed to be 'failure', just like what Grandpa Devon said of him. "So you're going to blame me, when Grandpa's the one that told me I should go ahead and kill myself because I'm so worthless?" The man wasn't even her father, he wasn't even John's father.

His mother, Marissa, passed away back in 2001 with his brother Josh. Since then he lived with his grandparents. Devon was always abusive while Ethel remained submissive and quiet. Lately it seemed like everybody blamed him and held his grandfather on a pedestal.

_"Fear teaches respect,"_ _Devon spoke while holding a fist in front of his grandson. "That's how you get someone to respect you."_

His stomach churned as he opened Skype to chat with a good friend of his, and mentor, Carly. Carly was like a sister to him, someone that helped him through a lot of trauma when he went into college. She was somebody that he met as a result of his blog and someone that helped him to write. "I wish I never left," he typed furiously, "I couldn't stay at Midwestern. I was failing, I couldn't focus, but now Tricia won't stop harping on me for leaving."

"Bullshit, she's the one that said it would be good for you to take a break!" Carly responded hastily. "What are you even doing over there? I thought your father was out of your life."

"Close to it. Grandpa and I got into another fight, things got a little physical so I left." He was going to head back home, though. Tricia's ranting on was about all he could take, and his stress levels were at an all-time high.

He struck the alt and tab keys on his computer, shifting over to yahoo messenger. When he saw her name in the contacts, his heart shot up. _Pyra_, it was Sam Puckett's screen name. Sam was a girl he met online, someone who saw a poem he put up on his blog and decided to talk to him.

They seemed to share some common interests, and she lived with her mother. Whenever they spoke, she always made him laugh. Before he could click her name, the Skype icon began to flash, so he switched over to see what Carly was saying.

"Kent is doing pushups, and it bothers me." Freddie brought his hand up to his chin and chuckled at the visual of his friend sitting before her boyfriend while he did pushups. "Oh look, he's doing them with one hand…show off."

"Hey you know that girl I told you about?"

"Sam or whatever? The one you've started developing feelings for?"

"Yes."

"Don't tell me you're still talking to her." He rolled his eyes and smiled as he glanced to the yahoo messenger. Carly was constantly advising him against communicating with this person, but he'd seen what she looked like and even heard her voice on the phone. She wasn't a bad person. Though, even the readers of his blog found her suspicious, but he was blind to these concerns, and confused as to why anybody thought ill of her when they didn't even know her.

But he knew her, oh yes he felt so close to her. The one good thing about this whole thing. "Freddie, what about Nicole?"

"I've had maybe three dates with her. She's just a friend I've known since I was in the eighth grade, nothing's going to happen with her." Nicole was a beautiful person though, and what more was, she was actually present in his life and not just behind a computer screen.

He decided to ask her out because while he was at Midwestern, she was the one that was on his mind all the time. Something he found odd, because he never felt anything for her before, but when he returned home, he just had to see her.

Nicole was a year younger than him and had been in behavioral classes throughout school, as well as on medication. Since coming back, she'd been able to take herself off the medication, and her behavior seemed fine.

A yahoo chat box popped up onto the screen and Sam's eager greeting made him smile. "Freddie, I hope your day is going well!"

"Well, it could be better, but it's fine now." He leaned back in his chair and glanced up as Tricia moved into her bedroom. His fingers hovered over the keys as he struggled to think of what to talk about. "Well, I'm looking forward to heading off to visit Uncle Henry and Aunt Bridget. They're letting me stay with them a while so I can get on my feet."

"Think you'll ever try to go back to Midwestern?"

"I want to, but I don't know."

"Momma says college is important, but it's okay if you don't. I approve." Carly had been irritated when Freddie told her how quickly Sam latched onto him. "Maybe you can one day." He wanted to, but a break was needed. In the end, Midwestern would always be a goal to return to.

It had been his mother's college, and it was where both his uncles as well as Aunt Bridget went to college as well. "I don't really know what I want to do with my life." His heart sank as he looked up to the clock. "I've got a shit father, abusive grandpa and a family I hardly know. I just…I wish I could get away from it all, you know?"

"Well…maybe you can?" He raised an eyebrow and watched as the chat box indicated she was still typing. "It's just me and mom here. Melanie's off with her boyfriend-I can't stand how she holds him above us! But that's beside the point! You could move in with us!"

"Move in with-I don't know." His heart pulled towards her but there was something in the back of his mind warning him off. At the same time, he'd fallen for her. He didn't know how he could have fallen for someone that lived several states away, but he had. Surely this girl and her mom would be better than the shithole of a hell he was living in now.

"Think about it. I love you, and we're _perfect_ for each other. Mom's saying all the time how I'm smiling more and I'm dancing whenever I get to talk to you."

"I feel the same." Talking to her was the only time he was ever happy anymore. Yet, so many people didn't see that. Carly didn't see it, but she was usually right about a variety of things. His readers didn't see it, and neither did his family. "I'll think about it."

Back home, anxiety was trembling through him while walking in to see his grandparents. He'd just finished talking to his uncle, who was Devon's eldest son and Marissa's older brother, and Henry told him to relax and try not to agitate the old man.

Henry was someone in the family that Freddie respected above all other relatives, it was uncanny especially when considering he lived five hours away. His family was the pious, religious sort. They didn't particularly care much for Sam either, and didn't seem all that approving when Freddie mentioned Sam was Mormon. A type of religion he himself didn't know anything about.

"Freddie," Devon called just as he slipped into his bedroom. He cringed at the man's voice and sighed, knowing better than to have expected not to be able to be seen. Bracing himself for another war, he looked to the door as the bald headed, cold eyed man stepped into the room. Behind him followed Ethel, Freddie's short, grey haired grandmother.

"What's up, Grandpa?" His nerves shot up and he looked to the doorway, praying for a way out. The man's voice was loud as it so often was.

"I don't appreciate you running off to your father and telling your uncle about our argument, making me look like the bad guy here." Freddie sat on the edge of his bed and let out a sigh as the man poked his finger at him. "It is not my fault you gave up on your education."

"Oh because you're so perfect. You'd never think pushing me and telling me I wasn't doing good enough was a problem."

"You weren't! You were making low grades and putting no effort into studying."

"I was studying every goddamn day."

"Oh you were?" Devon leaned forward and opened his eyes wide while parting his mouth like a fish. Freddie leaned back with a manner of disgust shooting through him. "Because it seems to me like you were spending all your time on that goddamn website."

He did study, but the depression he'd been in kept him unfocused. If he hadn't dropped out he would have failed, and his GPA would have been much worse. "You just think I'm worthless, that's all."

"You are! You'll never amount to anything if you keep doing things the way you are. You should spend your time studying, not screwing around on things that aren't important."

His phone began to ring and Devon leaned back, scowling as Freddie grabbed the phone. "Got to take this." When he answered the call, he heard Nicole's voice. It wasn't all that soothing and rather high pitched, but she still calmed his frayed nerves. "Nicole, hi." Devon through his hands into the air and stormed off with Ethel, complaining about how he couldn't talk to Freddie.

He closed his eyes and shook himself, trying to rid himself of the corrosive storm his emotions were in. "Freddie, I'm bored. What are you going to do about this?"

"You assume I'm going to do anything?" He raised an eyebrow and curled his lips into a smirk.

"The way I see it, we could do a number of things. I like your ideas better…"

"We could go to the park."

"So be it." Without bothering to hang up, he rushed from his room and out to his pickup truck. This was the best way to ignore his grandfather.

He drove out to Nicole's house to pick her up. Watching her walk towards the car, he felt a powerful strain of guilt. His decision had already been made to take Sam up on her offer, but now he had to find a way to tell his best friend that he'd be moving.

Though with her issues, she probably wouldn't care. "Mom and Dad are going at it again," Nicole said as she moved into her car. "I was trying to watch some anime, but I can't focus." It was all she ever did, watch anime and keep to herself.

Nicole swept her fingers through her short, light brown hair. It framed her soft face like a picture and made her cool blue eyes shine in the light. Though this beauty was about the only thing he saw in her that was good, but he never took much time to look.

On the outside, she was obsessed with video games and anime, never went to college and had terrible spelling. She had a number of medical issues growing up and hardly seemed sane due to the medication she had been on. She also had a nasty temper, and once threw a stapler at her teacher-although her reasoning was because the teacher said she was an idiot.

It was this rashness, this craziness that put Freddie off about her. Even the fact that she tried to kiss him in the ninth grade, thinking that it was a sign of friendship, was something that bothered him.

Yet, he couldn't keep her off his mind and he couldn't stop spending time with her, going so far as to take her on three dates. Even the last one, she held his hand and gave him a look that caused his heart to flutter. It was peculiar, something he didn't understand, but he wasn't going to say he didn't like it.

"I'd say we take my bike, but you can't ride a bicycle to save your life." Nicole bent her wrist and leaned her head against her hand while smirking at him. He scoffed back and curled his mouth into a smile. "That, and I need to work on my bike a little. The chain's starting to come off…again."

"Yeah." He started up the car and began driving to the park. His heart was pounding heavily in his chest and his muscles went rigid. "Hey Freddie, I'm glad we're, you know, past that awkwardness from the other day."

"What?"

"You know, when you said we should maybe just be friends?" He winced inwardly and looked out the window. He'd since forgotten about that, though it was difficult for him not to forget. After all, he told Nicole that over the phone and she said not only was her father listening in, but for some reason, she thought he was going to take the relationship to a higher level. Which seemed insane.

"Yeah, it's good." He looked back to her and furrowed his brow when he saw her fidgeting with her thumbs and staring down at her lap. She had a hardened expression on her face and sad eyes. "Hey? You alright?"

Her head shot up and her eyebrows rose. "What?" She chuckled nervously and waved her hand in the air. "I'm fine, just stressed out listening to mom and dad carry on. You know, I'm thinking more and more about cutting the medication completely. I'm still on a little of it, but…it causes some problems, I think."

"Such as?" She studied him for some time and Freddie slowly returned his gaze to the road. He leaned his head back and dropped his shoulders. "If you think you'd do better without, then I say go for it."

"Yeah."

"I uh, I've got something that I do think we need to talk about." He took a deep breath and slowly turned the vehicle onto a new street. "A friend of mine offered to let me move in with them." Nicole's eyebrows moved inwards and her lips seemed to falter.

"Oh? Well that's probably better for you, considering all the stuff you say about your family."

"I haven't made the decision yet, but it might be better. I don't think we'd be able to hang out though, she lives a few states away." Nicole's jaw dropped and hung in place for several seconds before she cleared her throat and turned her head away from him.

"I see. Well." She took a deep breath and shrugged. "I only wonder who to hang out with, I don't have any other friends."

"What about that kid, Riley? The guy whose ass I kicked at Super Smash Bros?" He smirked proudly and Nicole chuckled.

"I guess, but he's a little younger than I am and isn't…I don't know, we don't do things like you and I do. It'll be fine though, you'll come by and visit I hope."

"Sure…" He didn't know if it would be possible, but if he could, he'd love to see her every now and then. At the same time, he didn't know if Sam would appreciate it. Regardless, being with Sam would have to be better than where he was now.

* * *

They say the path to hell is paved with good intentions, and maybe so. Sometimes the grass looks greener when you have a pretty face offering you something, but sometimes that face can be a siren's call. Freddie's greatest mistake, maybe it was leaving college, but who knows. A good portion of this will take place during the relationship era, there will be some stuff after that point though. Stick with me, and again, thank you.


End file.
